


burn it all down and bring the ashes to me

by Rhovanel



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Banter, Chess, Epistolary, M/M, Post-Trespasser, everything is a metaphor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-30
Updated: 2018-09-30
Packaged: 2019-07-10 18:28:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15955019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rhovanel/pseuds/Rhovanel
Summary: Whether in love or in war, there’s only one way to play a game: one piece at a time.





	burn it all down and bring the ashes to me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gamerfic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gamerfic/gifts).



Solas’s spies are always easy to spot. Elves who make themselves quietly useful, always busy with their hands in order to draw attention away from their watchful eyes. Bull goes through the routine again and again: he confronts them quietly, lets them pack their belongings, escorts them out whatever camp or city or outpost they’ve embedded themselves in, and watches until he can no longer see them in the distance.

As he turfs one out of their camp for the third time in five weeks, he gives her a folded scrap of vellum.

“Here,” he says, tucking it into the top of her pack. “You know who it’s for.” 

* * *

_Get better spies._

* * *

Bull and the Chargers are moving through the Hissing Wastes, clearing out pockets of Venatori. Skinner and Dalish bitch constantly about the cold nights, Krem keeps adding verses to his “elegy to taverns”, and he’s pretty sure Rocky’s started rolling himself down the sand dunes and into varghest nests just to piss off Stitches, but Bull likes the desert. He likes the endless surfaces of sand and sky, and how the longer you stay there, the less empty it becomes.

At night, he often sits and watches the stars. Sometimes he thinks of Ashkaari Koslun, who made his own journey into the desert and found answers that shaped the history of his people. _The sea and the sky themselves: Nothing special. Only pieces._

But as he lets the sand grains fall between his fingers, he’s pretty sure that there’s nothing ‘only’ about pieces.

He’s had more than two years to think about Solas. He’s turned his absence and his deception over and over in his mind, until the edges are smooth and it no longer hurts to do so. He still reaches for it instinctively in quiet moments like these, like the river stones the Karasaad carry in their pockets to help calm their minds and focus their thoughts.

One evening the Chargers trudge into one of the old Inquisition camps after a long and bloody battle with a group of Venatori. The camp is quiet - now that the Inquisition is disbanded, they’re mainly used as gathering points for travellers, places for trade and medical attention and quiet conversation. Bull wants nothing more than a hot meal and a cup of something that burns his throat all the way down.

The merchant silently slips him a letter along with his food and drink. It’s the usual way Leliana sends word, and he takes it with a small nod of his head. He’s been expecting new orders for at least a week. Sitting down with a groan, he takes a large gulp of his drink, then opens it to find a single question.

* * *

_Are you watching the pieces, Tal-Vashoth, or are you watching the board?_

* * *

He looks sharply up at the merchant, who is serving the rest of the Chargers with an easy smile. Merchants are rarely spies themselves, he knows: too difficult to leave in a hurry, too easy and obvious a target. He carefully catalogues the rest of the camp: some scholars from the university, two tired looking Chantry members, a group of dwarves who must be on their way to the Fairel excavation. None of them are Solas’s - for starters, they’re not elves, but they’re all absorbed in their own tasks and completely oblivious to Bull’s gaze. Whoever dropped this off is long gone.

He sighs, looking back at the note, then grabs a pen and turns it over.

 

* * *

  _We don’t have a board, remember?_  

* * *

 

 He stares at the paper for a long time before adding a single line at the bottom.

 

* * *

_Pawn to E4._   

* * *

 

He leaves it with the merchant the next morning.

“Who’s this for?”

“There’ll be a group of elves coming through in the next few days. Give it to them.”

The merchant frowns. “Are you sure?”

Bull looks at the letter.

“Yeah,” he says, but he knows he’s not talking about the elves.

  

* * *

_Are we not all guided by forces invisible to the eye? Our every move choreographed according to belief, to desire, to duty?_

_Pawn to E5._  

* * *

  _So that’s your big plan: get rid of the board and sweep all the pieces onto the floor? Sounds more like a temper tantrum to me._  

_Ben-Hassrath to F3._

* * *

_A weaver has devoted her life to her craft. She weaves intricate tapestries, full of detail and texture and shape. She can weave all she puts her mind to: landscapes real and imagined, the infinite shapes of people and animals and plants. But she only ever uses thread in shades of grey, for that is all she has ever known._

_One day she finds a basket in her workroom. She opens it to see a rainbow of colours, reds and blues and greens and yellows spilling out across the floor. She realises that her tapestries have only ever captured a portion of the world, that her vision has always been limited, and she weeps for the brightness of the threads she holds in her hands._

_Is her future not more promising than her past? Is her world not more complete? Are her choices not exponentially greater than before?_

_Knight to C6._  

* * *

  _Didn’t make a choice, though. The basket was left for her by someone who thought they knew better._

_Maybe she was happy enough with her greys. Maybe they were complex enough. Maybe she wouldn’t have chosen the colour if she had the option._

_Tamassran to B5._  

* * *

  _You did._

  _Knight to E7._  

* * *

  _Not the same, and you know it. You gotta understand the context if you want to appreciate the choice._

_Besides, I look best in black._

_Pawn to C3._  

* * *

  _The details are hardly relevant. The essence of a choice is always the same: the courage to act against convention and to direct one’s life anew._  

_And I seem to recall your fondness for a certain pair of striped trousers._

_Pawn to D6._

* * *

  _Come on, you were always more interested in my clothes off than on. One of the very first questions you ever asked me was how to take my shirt off._

_Pawn to D4._

* * *

  _I asked you how you put your shirt ON._

 _Mage to D7._  

* * *

  _Oh, so now you’re interested in the details?_

 _King to F1._  

* * *

 

“What are you smirking about, chief?” He looks up to see Krem approaching him, a grin on his face. He puts two drinks down on the table, and Bull takes a grateful sip from his.

“Thanks.”

“So….whatcha writing?” He reaches across for the letter on the table. Bull slams his fist down on it, making their drinks slop onto the table.

“Oooh, a _private_ letter!” Krem leers at him.

“Yeah, like you’ve haven’t been writing up a storm with Maryden. What’re you two doing, composing an epic ballad?’

Krem blushes.

“Fuck, you are, aren’t you,” Bull groans. “Just leave me out of it this time.”

“You didn’t like ‘he still finds the time to roar through the night’?” Krem’s grin broadens, and he gestures at the letter. “I bet your lover there would.”

“Leave it, Krem,” he growls.

“Alright chief, have it your way,” Krem laughs, getting up from the table. “But you can’t fool me. I know a love letter when I see one.”

 

* * *

_You wish to discuss details? You desire context?_

_A landslide changes the course of a river. It is an unprecedented event, an accident of chance. The land downstream withers and dies, and the new riverbanks flood, ruining crops and fields. Birds migrate to the new water course where the fish are plentiful, and the farming communities lose their source of food. The world is a careful balance of multiplicities: if one part twists, the rest will turn; if one element wilts, the others will wither._

_Can you fault the effort to re-route that river? Can you blame the need to set things right?_

_Knight to G6._

* * *

_Depends. How long are we talking? All of those effects take time, and with enough time again, things would adjust. Find a new balance. We’re resilient like that, don’t you think?_

_Ben-Hassrath to G7._  

* * *

_But it would not be right. Not as it was supposed to be._

_Pawn to H6._  

* * *

_Supposed to be according to who? Way I see it, you shift that river back to its original path, you just kill all the new stuff - all the babies that grew up not knowing any different. Different isn’t always bad - you should know that._

_Ben-Hassrath to F7, takes pawn._

* * *

_You can’t honestly believe that scar tissue is as good as smooth skin._

_King takes knight at F7._  

* * *

_Maybe not. But scars say you survived the damage - that you picked yourself up and kept going, found a way to bounce back, that change and chance didn’t kill you._

_I like my scars. Pretty sure you did once, too._

_Tamassran to C4._

* * *

_You are thinking on too small a scale. Some scar tissue cuts deep to the muscle, and never really heals. It festers and pulls and does more damage with every passing year. It needs to be cut out before the muscle can heal._

_But I concede your point. I did like your scars._

_King to E7_. 

* * *

 “A moment,” Leliana says.

Bull is on his way out of her tent at the Sunstop Mountain camp. He’d been surprised to see her on their return after another week-long excursion across the desert. He knew better than to ask her business, instead patiently debriefing her on the Chargers’ activity against the Venatori.

Leliana looks at him for a long moment with her measured gaze, the one that always makes him feel like he’s been caught with a beer in one hand and his pants in the other.

She stands and crosses to the tent flap, gazing out of it at the desert

“I won’t insult you by questioning your loyalty,” she says. Bull frowns.

“Alright,” he says evenly. They’ve all heard the rumours of Qunari uprisings in the north, but he doesn’t know what this has to do with him. He’s been Tal-Vashoth for too long.

Leliana turns and looks at him, arms over her chest, her face troubled.

“You’ll tell me if he says anything useful, won’t you.” It’s not a question, and it doesn’t need an answer. Bull’s stomach lurches, but he keeps his face impassive.

"I know what I’m doing, Red.”

The silence stretches out between them for a long moment. She sighs and leans back against the small table.

"Lavellan thinks we can change his mind."

“Lavellan would wait a lifetime for the sun to rise in the west and call it hope.”

She smiles. “True. It’s what made them such a good Inquisitor.”

“Yeah,” he replies. “Yeah, it was.”

‘What do you think?’

Bull pauses. “I think that when you’ve been picking up your sword in your right hand for your entire life, it’s hard to suddenly use your left. Even harder when it’s all mixed up with guilt and pride and stubbornness.”

“He always was impossibly stubborn.”

“No,” he says. “I mean, stubborn, fuck yes, but impossible? Nah. Just need someone patient to show you the way.”

She meets his eyes, then gives a small nod. “You’re a good man, Bull. Just be careful, won’t you?”

Bull snorts. “Look at me, Red,” he says, running a hand up one of the scars on his arms. “I’ve been split open and stitched back up before. Takes a lot to knock me down for good.”

“I wasn’t talking about your body, Bull.”

He meets her eyes. “Yeah, I wasn’t either.” 

* * *

_Do you remember the first night you came to my bed? You were so nervous I thought I’d have to tie your hands down to just to stop them shaking. You wouldn’t have been the first to be scared of fucking a Qunari. But when I asked, you said you felt like you were standing on the edge of a precipice. You said the air was thick with unforeseen possibilities, and it frightened you._

_Are your hands shaking now, kadan?_

_Arishok to H5._

* * *

_Bull, please. You cannot understand._

_Queen to E8._  

* * *

_I think they are. I think you’re shit scared. I think you’re so set in your ways that the idea of doing something different terrifies you, and you don’t know who you are without this damn crusade._

_Arishok to G5._

* * *

_Perhaps you are the one who does not know me as well as you think. Is that not the question you have been asking yourself?_

_Pawn takes queen at G5._

* * *

_What questions have I been asking? I had to question my whole damn identity after the Storm Coast. I had to build myself back up again piece by piece. So maybe I know something about this. Are you too fucking proud to listen? Too damn arrogant to think that maybe you’re not the special case you think you are?_

* * *

_I know I have hurt you, and I apologise. It was not my intent. But our situations are not the same, in ways that I can never explain._

_It is your move._  

* * *

_No, I’ve had enough. We do this in person or we don’t do it at all. I know you know where I am._

* * *

  _It is not like you to forfeit._  

* * *

_I thought you told me to watch the board?_  

* * *

 

 “Can’t sleep, chief?”

Bull looks over to where Krem sits by the fire at their makeshift camp. He’d volunteered for first watch, which Bull suspects has something to do with the thick letter that was waiting for him at the last tradepost.

“Nah,” he replies. “Gonna go for a walk, clear my head.”

“Sure thing. I’d tell you to be careful, but there’s fuck all out here.”

Bull snorts in agreement. “Pretty sure I’m only in danger of getting sand in my pants.”

Krem looks aghast. “Chief! I don’t need the details of your night-time excursions!”

“Ha!” Bull laughs, slapping him on the shoulder. “Why don’t you point that dirty mind of yours towards someone who’ll appreciate it more? A certain bard, maybe?”

Krem blushes, and Bull laughs again, striding out of camp.

“Hey chief!”

He turns to look back over his shoulder.

“You okay? It’s just…you’ve been kinda quiet these last few weeks.”

“Yeah,” he replies. “I’m good. Just got a lot on my mind.”

“Alright,” says Krem, and goes back to his letter.

Bull pauses for a moment on the edge of camp. “Hey Krem?” he calls. “Thanks. Appreciate it.”

“Any time, chief,” Krem replies casually, but Bull can tell he’s pleased.

He walks for a time along the sand dunes, content to simply be a body moving under the stars. Eventually he sits, closing his eyes and listening to the gentle sound of sand in the evening breeze.

A prickle on his neck tells him that someone is watching him, and he opens his eyes with a start.

Solas is standing on the crest of the dune, cloak billowing in the wind.

Bull holds his ground, waiting for Solas to approach. Solas may be stubborn, but Bull is patient, and he has to believe that will win out in the end.

Sure enough, Solas slowly comes to take a seat on the sand next to him, just out of arm’s reach.

“I cannot give you the answers you seek,” he says, breaking the silence.

“Who said I’m looking for answers?”

“Is that not why I am here?”

“You tell me,” Bull says evenly.

Solas glares at him. “You are being presumptuous,” he snaps. “You think to extrapolate your own experience onto mine without regard for the context you claim to put so much faith in.”

“Okay, fair,” Bull replies. “Then why don’t you tell me about it?’”

Solas just glares at him.

“Alright,” Bull says. “What’s it like being public enemy number one?”

“Tedious,” Solas replies, and Bull snorts.

“Well, what did you expect?”

He sighs. “This is not a good idea, Bull.”

Bull raises an eyebrow at him. “No offence, Solas, but there’s not a lot of evidence to suggest you know what is and isn’t a good idea.”

Solas chuckles, a soft exhalation of laughter that he quickly swallows, looking somewhat startled. Bull wonders how long it’s been since he smiled, and something clenches in his heart.

“You know,” he says, “once upon a time, I’d just fuck this melancholy mood out of your system.”

Solas laughs again, but the sound catches in his throat. " _Mi’nas’sal’inan, ara lath,_ " he says.

“Oh no,” Bull shakes his head. “Enough of these masks. Stop hiding behind allegories and metaphors and words I won’t understand.”

‘What would you have me do?’ Solas asks, angry and a little helpless. “It is too late.”

“Always stuck in the past,” Bull says with a shake of his head. “You always thought there was more important things than the here and now.”

“Someone has to watch the board,” Solas says.

“And that someone is you, I ‘spose?”

“Who else?”

“I forgot how much of an arrogant ass you can be,” Bull says, but he meets Solas’s eyes with a smile.

“Bull, it is not that simple,” Solas says, but there’s a hint of a question in his voice.

“What if it is?”

“It is not.”

“It might be.”

Solas makes an exasperated noise. “This level of debate is beneath both of us.”

“Hmm,” Bull murmurs. “Is that why you came? To debate me?” Solas looks at him, his gaze impenetrable.

“Can I ask you something?” he says abruptly, shifting along the sand towards him. Bull nods.

“Sure.”

“Your move,” Solas says. “Do you know what it is?”

“Really?” Bull rolls his eyes. “You want to talk about this now?”

Solas doesn’t break his gaze.

Bull smirks. “Yeah, damn straight I know what it is.” He reaches out and cups Solas’s face gently in his hand, running his thumb along his jaw.

“Bull,” Solas whispers, but he doesn’t turn away. His eyes are very dark in the moonlight, and he reaches out to lay his hand along Bull’s forearm.

Bull takes the opportunity to pull him into his lap, and they simply look at one another for a time. His thumbs rub small circles into Solas’s hips, and Solas reaches up to trace his fingers down Bull’s chest.

“Well?” Solas asks. It was never about chess, Bull knows that. But where he tried to tell himself it was about traded allegories and opposing strategies and games of war, he knows that Krem was right. It’s always been a love letter.

“Tamassran takes pawn at G5,” he says, just as Solas leans in to kiss the words from his lips. “Checkmate.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for [gamerfic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gamerfic/) for the 2018 Black Emporium exchange, who asked for a story about Solas and Iron Bull debating history and politics and playing chess. The chess banter is one of my favourite parts of the game and I’d been wanting to write something epistolary for a while, and this just came together naturally. I hope you enjoy it.
> 
> Writing Solas post-Trespasser is always tricky. I’ve left the ending ambiguous, and you may interpret it as you wish. And I don’t really know anything about chess, so don’t look too hard at the game. It’s a metaphor, okay?
> 
> The section of the Qun quoted here is taken from the codex, and the elven from [this](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3553883/chapters/7825850/) incredible resource.
> 
>  _Mi’nas’sal’inan, ara lath_ \- I have missed you, my love.
> 
> The title comes from Arcade Fire’s “We Don’t Deserve Love.”


End file.
